USS Constellation (1854)

USS Constellation

Constellation at Baltimore's Inner Harbor
History
United States
Builder	Norfolk Naval Shipyard
Laid down	25 June 1853
Launched	26 August 1854
Commissioned	28 July 1855
Renamed	Old Constellation, 1 December 1917
Renamed	Constellation, 24 July 1926
Decommissioned	16 June 1933
Recommissioned	24 August 1940
Reclassified	Miscellaneous Unclassified (IX-20), 8 January 1941
Decommissioned	4 February 1955
Stricken	15 August 1955
Status	Museum ship
General characteristics
Type	Sloop-of-war
Displacement	1,400 long tons (1,400 t)
Length	181 ft (55 m) (lwl) 199 ft (61 m) (loa)
Beam	41 ft (12 m) (waterline) 43 ft (13 m) (maximum)
Draft	21 ft (6.4 m)
Propulsion	Sail
Complement	21 officers 265 sailors
Armament	16 × 8 in (203 mm) chambered shell guns 4 × 32-pounder (15 kg) long guns 1 × 20-pounder (9 kg) Parrott rifle 1 × 30-pounder (14 kg) Parrott rifle 3 × 12-pounder (5 kg) bronze boat howitzers
USS Constellation (Frigate)
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. National Historic Landmark
Location	Baltimore, Maryland
Coordinates	39°17′07.9″N 76°36′40.3″W / 39.285528°N 76.611194°W / 39.285528; -76.611194
NRHP reference No.	66000918[1]
Significant dates
Added to NRHP	15 October 1966
Designated NHL	23 May 1963[2]

USS Constellation is a sloop-of-war, the last sail-only warship designed and built by the United States Navy. She was built at the Gosport Shipyard between 1853 and 1855. She was named for the earlier frigate of the same name that had been broken up in 1853. The sloop's primary armament was 8-inch (203 mm) shell-firing guns and four 32-pounder long guns, though she carried other guns as well, including two Parrott rifle chase guns. Constellation's career as a front-line unit was relatively short; after entering service in 1855, she served with the Mediterranean Squadron until 1858, and in 1859, she was assigned as the flagship of the Africa Squadron, where she served with the African Slave Trade Patrol. During the American Civil War (1861–1865), the ship returned to the Mediterranean to patrol for Confederate vessels. In late 1864, she returned to the United States to be decommissioned, as most of her crews' enlistments had expired. She spent the rest of the war out of service.

Constellation was recommissioned in 1871 for use as a training ship, being used for shooting practice and training cruises for midshipmen. She filled this role for twenty-two years, and during this period, she saw a number of other activities, including transporting exhibits for the 1878 Exposition Universelle in Paris and carrying food to Ireland during the 1879 Irish famine. She was reduced to a stationary training hulk in late 1893, being moored in Newport for the next twenty years. During this period, the mistaken belief that the two Constellations were one and the same arose, and she was presented as such in 1914 during the centennial of the writing of "The Star-Spangled Banner", the national anthem of the United States. Briefly renamed Old Constellation in 1917 to free the name for a new battlecruiser of the Lexington class, she reverted to her original name when the battlecruiser was scrapped in 1925. Constellation was recommissioned in 1940 as part of the build-up in anticipation of the United States' entry into World War II, during which she served as the port flagship of the commander of the Atlantic Fleet.

Proposals to restore the vessel as a museum ship had been submitted already in the 1930s, but work began in earnest after World War II. Shortages of funds prevented her transfer to the city of Baltimore, Maryland until 1955. Operating under the mistaken belief that she was the original Constellation, the organization responsible for the ship modified her to match the earlier vessel's appearance during a refit in the late 1950s and early 1960s. During this period, a controversy arose over the vessel's identity that lasted into the 1990s, when new research definitively proved that the Constellation launched in 1797 and the 1854-launched vessel were distinct ships. Periodic repairs have been carried out since the mid-1990s to repair rotted wood. Constellation remains open to the public as part of the Historic Ships in Baltimore in the city's Inner Harbor, having been designated a National Historic Landmark.